


objects in the mirror

by bluemoone



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Attempted Sexual Assault, Childhood Friends to Lovers, Coming of Age, Depression, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Grief/Mourning, Healing, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Mutual Pining, POV Alternating, Sexual Content, Shadow Weaver | Light Spinner (She-Ra)'s A+ Parenting, Time Skips
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-21
Updated: 2021-01-25
Packaged: 2021-03-11 03:22:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 15,527
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28178313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluemoone/pseuds/bluemoone
Summary: “Can I touch you?”Adora freezes. It’s stupid, she knows, but in this moment, she aches for nothing more than the ability to reach behind and pull them both back to a time where she would make fun of Catra for evenasking. She could lace their fingers together and not once consider the possibility of an alternate universe where they could hurt each other with medical precision, where they would plunge needles into bruises they’ve only shown each other.Her hand itches to have that contact again, and she imagines all the ways that she would sayyes.Adora numbly shakes her head. “Probably not a good idea.”-through the years it seems that adora and catra can endure anything together but their disorienting feelings for each other. when a loss draws them back in each other’s lives, they have to face the demons that drove them apart. a modern au.
Relationships: Adora/Catra (She-Ra), Bow/Glimmer (She-Ra), Catra/Scorpia (She-Ra), Mermista/Sea Hawk (She-Ra), Perfuma/Scorpia (She-Ra)
Comments: 20
Kudos: 120





	1. in the space between us.

**Author's Note:**

> hi! major content warnings are listed in the tags, but if you'd like to take a look at a more comprehensive, detailed list that are a _tad_ spoilery, i've created a carrd [here](https://aplacetoreturn.carrd.co/). also, the [playlist](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/64qdOH4Q5r0PymiFfX4cgc).

_Love does not begin and end the way we seem to think it does._

_Love is a battle, love is a war;_

_Love is a growing up._

_— James Baldwin_

_the day._

_What a day_ , Adora thinks blandly as she pulls into a familiar spot in the parking lot of a familiar apartment bulding nestled in the center of what is affectionately known as The Crimson Waste.

(To its credit, the district has really come up over the years, at least in the ways people care about: There's been a significant decline in crime. The pesky, rundown family-owned shops have been replaced with modish bars and gimmicky wellness studios, and the housing market value has gone way, way up!)

Newcomers call it by its proper name, Redwood, but to those who know it well, it will always be the Waste. And no matter how much the city of Etheria changes, it always calls Adora back. Not so much as a sanctuary as an omen. A siren song.

This could be why Adora feels like she’s drifting underwater, her limbs heavy and weightless all at once; could explain why she doesn’t feel the pavement underneath her feet when she steps out of her car; and why she’s been summoned to this familiar door when the last thing she recalls is being in a hospital. 

She knocks. The sound is muffled as if wrapped in cotton. The following silence underscores the pulse of her heartbeat reverberating throughout her entire body, and six heartbeats later Adora swears she hears an irked voice mutter, _“Fucking finally,”_ from the other side of the door before it swings open and she certainly hears, “Oh. You’re not Seamless.”

Adora looks at Catra, and the first thing she notices is her hair. She’s grown it out again. This isn’t a surprise. It’s not like she hasn’t fallen victim to the occasional late-night social media stalk session or the rare passing encounter over breaks from school, but Adora sees it, long and wild and freely spiraling past her shoulders, and she feels relief. Not that she didn’t like it short — Catra could pull off any hairstyle — but this looks like the Catra Adora used to know, before...

Before.

The second thing Adora notices is her nails as her fingers stay hooked over the edge of the door. They’re short, still. This isn’t a surprise, either. It just conjures up a memory of the night she had Adora cut them for her so she could learn to play the guitar. 

_(“Ah! I’m naked!”_

“Relax _. They look fine.”_

_“I have man hands now.”_

_“You’re so dramatic. They’re not that short. Besides...they’ll probably come in handy one day, yeah?”_

_“I know, I know..."_

_A pause._

_“Wait, was that a gay joke?”_

“You’re _a gay joke.”)_

Then Adora takes in everything else: her black track pants; her black t-shirt, stretched out at the neck with _pseudoromantic_ etched across the chest in red (She's pretty sure they were together when she bought that shirt.); the little cluster of bumps on her chin that always pop up when she’s on her period; her signature smirk that could mean anything from _touch me and I’ll break you_ to _kiss me, you freak_ ; and then her eyes. Always the eyes. One stormy blue like the tempestuous sea, the other deep amber like quicksand, together pulling Adora under time and time again. 

“Can I come in?” Adora moves forward without waiting for an answer, steamrolling her way into the narrow foyer. 

Catra grunts in protest, follows up with a belated and begrudging, “Sure, why the hell not?”

“The place looks nice,” Adora comments idly as the door slams behind her. Her eyes graze over the white walls of the apartment, littered with various prints of various sizes, and its high ceiling. She notes how small the grey loveseat pushed against the back wall looks in comparison, then a particular print hanging off by the kitchen catches her eye. “Hey! Bowie’s still here!” Adora takes in the mugshot of David Bowie in all his splendor with a wistful smile. 

“Yeah...” says Catra, trailing her into the living room, her hands shoved in her pockets. “Hey, not to be rude, but what the fuck are you doing here?” 

It’s a fair question. They haven’t spoken in a long time. 

The thing is, though: Adora doesn't really know what she’s doing here. Surely, she could figure it out if she sat down and dissected it, but not yet. Not now.

Adora quirks a wider smile that she hopes is more _charm_ and less _creep_ to retort, “Since when do you care about being rude?”

Catra crosses her arms, tilts her head, squints her eyes. She stays like that, embodying the holy trinity of suspicion, for an uncomfortably long time, then finally says, “You’re being weird.”

Okay. So much for charming.

Adora swivels to peer out of the array of windows forming the opposite wall. She takes in the view of the city from beyond the balcony. The sharp steeple of St. Mary's Church towers over the surrounding buildings like a dagger pointed right at Adora’s throat. Her breath feels heavy in her body.

Droplets of rain start to spatter against the windows, start darkening the sparse patio furniture outside, and Adora watches, almost awestruck. A cluster of dark clouds have gathered overhead, but looking out into the distance, maybe half a mile out, the sun is still shining. Funny.

“It’s raining and sunny at the same time?” she notes, pointing out the window as if Catra can’t blatantly see for herself. “I’d say _that’s_ pretty weird.” 

Catra snorts derisively, “Yeah, Jesus is weeping, apparently.” 

The comment, offhand as it is, shocks like an icy ocean wave, and once it ebbs, Adora starts chuckling. “Oh, wow. Yeah, that makes sense. Jesus is- oh my _god."_ Her words are cut off by broken laughter, labored and stuttering like a car jerking ahead on potholed ground. "That’s so _funny_. You’re so funny, Catra...” 

Eyes glued on the sky, Adora reaches for Catra’s narrow shoulder, squeezes it and doesn’t think about the way Catra tenses underneath the contact. 

“What the hell is happening? Are you on something?”

Adora looks at Catra, and Catra looks back at her like she’s two seconds away from having her committed. “Oh, you don’t get it! You said Jesus is _weeping_ ,” Adora explains, interrupted by another chuckle, “and my mom died today.”

A thick, grey silence falls between them, turns the air to lead. 

The muscles in Catra’s face go slack. 

Sobering, Adora repeats, “My mom died today.” 

Huh. Yeah, it wasn't that funny. 

More than a confession, it’s a startling realization, this being the first time she's had to say the words out loud. The veil deadening her senses drops, thrusting Adora into that blinding reality, and it's as harsh and unbearable as looking into the sun. 

“Oh,” Catra eloquently says. “Oh, shit. I-” 

Adora flinches, though nothing touched her.

She needs to sit down.

No. She needs to move. 

_No_. She should —

“Sorry. I should go.” 

She feels for her keys in her pocket, heads for the door, too many thoughts swimming in her head. Catra tries to stop her. Surprisingly. 

“Wait, Ador- _Adora._ Wait. _Stay,_ okay?” Catra manages to grab her free hand right as Adora turns the corner into the entryway. “You can’t just tell me something like that and leave. What the hell?” 

Adora tries to say something, anything, but her vocal chords refuse to close together. Catra doesn’t let go of her hand. Slowly, Adora turns to face her and finds her looking back with —

It’s not pity, exactly, but it’s the closest thing to pity she’s ever seen out of her old friend, and she’s not sure she likes it. 

“C’mon,” Catra coaxes in a tone gentler than anything Adora’s heard from her in years. She thrusts her chin in the direction of the kitchen. “I, uh, I made tea.” 

Catra pulls her hand away, and it’s a testament to Adora’s will, her growth, that she doesn’t immediately reach out and yank it back.

She lets Catra lead her to her sad excuse of a dining area — a wooden card table with two chairs sculpted from wood and tubular metal on either side nestled right outside the kitchen, right next the bathroom door. At least Bowie’s right there for comfort. And a candle. Catra still likes cinnamon, apparently.

Adora’s instructed to sit while Catra rummages through the white cabinets in her small, but well-kept kitchen for tea bags and a mug. Adora watches her back as she moves.

It’s strange. Twenty-four hours ago, she was back at Brightmoore, in the middle of defending her senior thesis that she's dedicated countless hours to build over the past year.

And here she is now, with no family and sitting in the kitchen of her ex-... ex- _something_ , awaiting _tea_. She wants to go back to laughing again. 

“Here.” Catra sets a nice, clear mug filled with the piping hot green liquid down in front of her. 

“Thanks,” Adora says gratefully. She drums her fingers against the side of the mug to give her hands something to do while the tea cools. The quote tag tied at the end of the string reads, _The plants have enough spirit to transform our limited vision._ She doesn’t get it. 

Catra hesitates slightly before taking the seat across from her, and Adora feels a pang through her sternum, thin and razor sharp. She distantly wonders if life really is just a series of losing things.

There’s a lot she wants to say, but can’t. 

A lot she needs to hear, but won’t. 

“It was cancer,” she says after a moment. “If you were wondering.”

“Oh.” Catra’s eyes widen. “Lung?”

Adora skates her index finger around the mug’s rim. “Good guess. Totally caught us off guard. The irony is that she quit smoking a long time ago. Crazy that it would catch up to her after all those years.” When Catra doesn’t respond, Adora chances a glance at her. She looks mildly horrified. Adora shrugs. “That’s life, I guess.”

Another silence.

Catra clears her throat. “How long was she sick?”

Adora's finger stills. “A few years or so," she reluctantly answers, wincing at the way her voice jumps up an octave.

She watches the agitated swivel of Catra’s jaw as she works out the math in her head. When she's done, Catra nods slowly, then says, somewhat resigned, “I see.” 

Adora considers throwing out an excuse, running through a slew of potential _I should have told you, but’s_ and _I would’ve told you if’s,_ but the plain fact is that even if she could do it all differently, she’d still make the same mistake. 

So she doesn’t say anything. She takes a sip of tea. It's mildly sweet with a hint of licorice and makes the back of her throat tingle. 

Catra’s hands do a little dance on the table, like she wants to reach out and she has to stop herself. “Well, if there’s anything I can do, let me know,” she says, earnest. Adora half-expects her to follow up with an _I’m here for you._ That’s what everyone seems to say when someone’s grieving. That’s not Catra’s style, though. She says what she means. 

Adora considers this as she cups a trembling hand over the top of the mug, warming her palm. She doesn’t want anything from Catra. Not anymore. 

_But here you are. Running back to her when life gets tough._ Adora rubs her temples, nodding, trapped between the casualty before her and the one behind. "I will, thanks," she murmurs half-heartedly. 

“...Can I touch you?”

Adora freezes.

It’s stupid, she knows, but in this moment, she aches for nothing more than the ability to reach behind and pull them both back to a time where she would make fun of Catra for even _asking_. She could lace their fingers together and not once consider the possibility of an alternate universe where they could hurt each other with medical precision, where they would plunge needles into bruises they’ve only shown each other.

Her hand itches to have that contact again, and she imagines all the ways that she would say _yes_. 

Adora numbly shakes her head. “Probably not a good idea.” 

Catra doesn’t look away or falter. She holds Adora with a devoted gaze, a kind reminder of the friend she once was. “Okay,” she says, her eyebrows knitted, and her hands disappear under the table. 

Adora closes her eyes for a second, and if she briefly imagines that Catra reached out and brushed a stray lock of hair behind her ear instead, no one has to know. 

She opens them. “I don’t know when the funeral is going to be yet,” God, Adora can’t believe she’s saying any of this, “but it’d mean a lot if you could come.” 

Catra gives a grin that dies as soon as it's born and asks, “Are you sure she’d want me there? You know I never got on her good side.” 

“Oh, come on,” Adora scoffs. “It’s my mom. She’ll take all the attention she can get.” 

Catra makes a choking sound, like she’s not sure if she’s allowed to laugh or not. (She’s not.)

“I want you there, so…” Adora goes on to say, pulling her lips back into something that’s not quite a smile, but wants to be. “She’ll just have to deal.” 

“Well, it wouldn’t be the first time I showed up uninvited, I guess.”

It's not weighed down with bitterness, the way Catra says it, but it sinks like a stone in water anyway. Adora doesn't know how to respond, but a lucky knock at the door relieves her of the task.

“Better be my food...” Catra grumbles and leaves her with enough time to scrub her hands over her face, run her hands through her hair. God, she must look a mess, having forewent any semblance of basic hygiene and grooming this morning — besides a quick and dirty teeth brushing — when she woke up to the call from the hospital. 

There’s a quick exchange between Catra and the delivery guy, and the smell of tangy spices hits her nose when Catra returns with a plastic bag filled to brim with containers and sets it on the counter. Adora’s a little touched when she immediately sits back down as if the food never existed in the first place. 

Remembering that there’s such a thing as etiquette, Adora asks, “How’s Scorpia?” She inwardly praises herself on the lack of edge in the question.

“Uh, she’s good,” Catra airily shrugs. “At work right now.” 

“Good. That’s good to hear,” she nods, and Catra nods, and they both nod in that slow, continuous way when neither party knows what to say next. “Good you guys are still together.”

Catra gives an affirmative hum, casually passes her index finger back and forth through the flame of the candle, a bare smile sweetening her face.

It leaves a bitter taste in Adora’s mouth. She wants to be happy for them. She _should_ be happy for Catra by now. Even if they aren’t on great terms, Catra, more than anybody, deserves to be happy. 

Doesn’t mean she wants to stick around and get a front row view of it. 

Pursing her lips, Adora stands up and shoves her hands into the pocket of her hoodie. “I should probably go. Let you eat. Thanks for, um, listening to me? And sorry for...whatever this was.”

“Hey, don’t apologize. You don’t have to leave.” Catra gets up and quickly unwraps her takeout. “Have some of my food. It’s Indian.” Then she adds, quiet, tentative, “We could watch a movie.”

Adora knows now that everything can’t be fixed so simply, but it’s obvious that Catra’s _trying_ , so Adora smiles wide in complete betrayal of herself. “I should really go. I have a paper due by midnight, anyway.”

Catra freezes. “Wait, what? You’re not seriously worried about homework right now.”

Adora sighs, “It’s not _homework_. It’s my final paper. Like, my final paper ever. Well, probably not _ever,_ but before I graduate.”

Everything’s going according to plan. Everything is so according to plan, in fact, that it makes Adora’s head spin. Once she submits this paper, she’ll be done with undergrad. She’s set to walk in a week and a half. She’s worked her ass off to get accepted into Brightmoore’s even more competitive law program next fall. All she needs to do now is not fuck it all up. She owes her mom that. 

“Adora...” Catra says, the softness in her words like fingernails ghosting up the ridge of Adora’s spine. “I’m sure your snooty professors can let you off the hook for this particular circumstance.” 

Adora raises an eyebrow and challenges back with the self-assuredness of a fanned out peacock. “Maybe so, but I don’t need them to.”

Catra rolls her eyes the same way she used to when Adora went into "overdrive," as she called it. “Okay, fine _,_ but work on it here, yeah? You can use my computer.” 

Adora looks at her skeptically.

“I just don’t think you should be alone right now.” 

“I really appreciate your concern, Catra,” says Adora slowly. “But I won’t be alone for long. Bow and Glimmer should make it in town by nine or so.” 

“Oh.” Adora knows she’s hit _that_ nerve when Catra’s eyebrow starts twitching. “Okay. If that’s what you want. I’ll walk you out.” 

The disappointed edge in Catra’s voice smears Adora with a flicker of guilt that gives way to a lick of indignation before it fades. 

She shouldn't have come here.

Why did she come here? 

Adora lingers at the doorstep, rocking on the ball of her foot. She's never been good at managing goodbyes. She still isn't. “Thanks, again.” 

Catra gives her a little nod, then says, “My number’s the same. If you...you know.”

Adora mirrors the nod and says, “Thanks.”

She’s almost at the steps when Catra calls out. “And Adora?”

“Yeah?” 

“...I’m sorry.”

Adora draws her upper lip between her teeth and shakes her head as if she could wave the words away. "You're the last person I want an apology from."

_ten years ago._

“I’m sorry, I-” Adora raised her hand, speaking up before she was called. “Sorry, Mrs. Razz, I thought the test was on the _eighteenth?_ ”

“Oh, no, dearie, it’s written right there on the board.” 

Adora squinted at the board. There had to be a mistake. It was definitely written on the board that the test on chapters five through eight was on the —

The thirteenth. 

Shit. _Shoot_. 

She was screwed.

From beside her came a snort. “Someone needs glasses.”

Adora whirled in her seat. “Shut _up,_ Catra.”

“Or _what,_ Adora?”

Adora glared at the girl next to her, unable to think of a quick enough response. 

Unbelievable that Ms. Razz actually thought pairing their desks together would make them get along. There was no getting along with Catra, with her bushy hair and her perpetually chipped blue nail polish and her eyes that were two completely different colors. Like, just pick one already. 

Catra hated her. Nothing was going to change that. 

And it wasn’t like Adora hadn’t tried. She _tried_ to be Catra’s friend. She invited her to her pool party, even though her mother told her not to, and she didn’t come. She invited her to sit with her and her friends at lunch, to which Catra sharply responded, _“I’d rather eat glass than eat with_ you _.”_ She’d been nothing but _nice_ to Catra since the day they met, and all she got in response was hostility. Catra didn’t deserve her kindness.

Why couldn’t she get paired with Kyle instead? He was sweet and cute in a nerdy way, and he always shared his gum. 

Ms. Razz told them to settle down from across the room as she dropped the pile of tests on Kyle and Lonnie’s desks to pass along to the students behind them. Adora fumed in her seat, annoyed by Catra, but angrier at herself for making such a dumb mistake. 

According to her last progress report, she had a ninety-six in the class, but if she failed this test, it had the potential to pull her down to a C, and Adora didn’t get _C’s._ She was an ‘A’ student through and through. It was in her name! _A_ for Adora.

C’s were for people like _Catra_ , who never showed up to school on time and wore the same pair of jeans every day like no one would notice.

Catra flippantly passed a copy of the test to her before sending the rest of the stack over her shoulder, and Adora felt heat boiling between her ears. 

If she didn’t have to check out for her dentist appointment yesterday, she would have realized. She should have just finished reading _The Iliad,_ anyway, even though she thought she had more time. This could have been prevented so easily. 

Everyone was looking at her. She could feel them. Twenty-one pairs of eyes fixed on her with snickering judgment. 

_Was she really that dumb?_

_Guess she’s not as smart as she thought._

_She’ll probably have to retake English class. Who fails sixth grade English? She does._

The room went deafeningly silent once all the papers were administered. Adora clicked her pen as she scanned the questions on the test. The first half was multiple choice. That was a relief. That, she could handle, especially since Razz always threw in an obvious throwaway option for each question. 

The second half, however, were essays. There’s no faking an essay.

Adora fiddled with the corner of the paper. Clicked her pen again.

“God, will you _stop?”_

Adora looked up to see Catra scowling back at her, her thick eyebrows scrunched together like they were trying to kiss. “What?” she asked, already mortified enough without _Catra_ making things worse. 

Instead of answering, Catra turned to Ms. Razz who’d begun knitting at her desk. “How is anybody supposed to concentrate when _she_ keeps clicking her pen?” said Catra, defensively.

Ms. Razz sighed without moving; her hands seemed to move the needles on their accord, independent from the rest of her body. “The pen is distracting, dear. Keep it down, will you?”

“Yes, Ms. Razz,” Adora nodded, a waver creeping into her voice.

She refused to give Catra the satisfaction of any more of her attention. She looked down at her paper. 

_After Agamemnon and Achilles argue, Achilles enlists..._

The words blurred on the page, and suddenly it was impossible to swallow, like someone pulled a drawstring to screw her throat shut. Her whole face was on fire, and by the time she tried to hold them back, two fat water droplets fell had already fallen onto her paper, smearing the black ink. She shielded her face with her hands so no one would see.

She was so stupid. So stupid. 

And trapped in this stupid situation. She couldn’t even ask to leave. 

She thought of giving up and turning in her test just like that. No, that was even worse. 

Adora scrubbed her face to rid herself of the tear streaks. _I wish I could die,_ she thought. _I’d rather die than fail this test._

Some time passed, and to make matters worse, Catra was the first to finish her test. Adora could already see the insufferably smug look she’d have on her face when she sat back down.

It was a small respite that Catra didn’t head straight back to her seat, but rather asked in a murmur to use the bathroom. Adora let out a breath. That’d spare her a few minutes. She could breathe marginally easier with Catra out of the room. 

_...Achilles enlists help from the "divine" to curse the Achaeans as long as he refuses to fight. Who does he enlist?_

His mom. She knew it was his mom, and she fumbled for her pen to circle: _B. Thetis_

The fire alarm stopped her. 

Startled, Adora jumped in her seat, and the entire class looked up at the same time. Even Ms. Razz looked surprised, even slightly annoyed — a rare occurrence for her fanciful, cheery disposition. 

“Alright, line up. You know the drill,” Ms. Razz directed, tossing her knitting project on the desk. 

Adora had to contain her thrill as she grabbed her coat and lined up at the door. Was God shining down on her? 

Multiple lines of students snaked down the halls, merging into a river running down the stairwell until they were met with the crisp chill of early spring outside. Her class formed a line by the flagpole, and Ms. Razz started calling roll. 

_Where’s Catra?_ she thought. 

Adora craned her head to the back of the line, and there she was, at the very end, her arms crossed tightly over one another. In nothing but a thin sweater and those jeans, her teeth were chattering from the cold. A pretty brutal gust of wind sent her hair flying in her face, and Adora could just see her mouth. Catra’s lips spread wide, but it was hard to tell if it was a smile or a grimace or a scowl. 

She vaguely toyed with the idea of taking off her jacket and sending it back to her (because she, for one, was actually a good person), but then she felt a tap on her shoulder. Adora blinked.

_"Adora!”_ Mrs. Razz yelled, clearly not for the first time.

“Here!” 

She spared one more glance at Catra before turning to face the front. 

“Woah, was there an actual fire?” 

Two fire trucks stopped in front of the building. Adora looked around. She didn’t see any fire. No smoke. 

“What if the building just-” Explosion noises. “-blows up?”

“I hope it does!” 

Adora wanted to tell the guys behind her to shut up, but if the building did blow up, she’d get out of her English test for sure. 

After twenty-five minutes in fifty degree weather and a mild frenzy of alarm and confusion, they were all sent back to class.

“Isn’t this convenient?” Ms. Razz said with an exasperated laugh as they all found their seats. Her coarse silver hair was wind-whipped and sticking out in all directions. She looked at her bare wrist, as if checking for the time. “We only have fifteen minutes left, so I suppose I’ll have to push the test back to Monday.” She wagged a wrinkled finger. “A new test, I might add. I’m not that old.” 

Catra fidgeted in her seat. 

“Catra, that includes you, too.”

She nodded wordlessly with wide eyes, her chin tucked under. 

If Adora didn’t know any better, she’d say Catra looked nervous. 

Ms. Razz told them to pass their papers forward, and they were given free time for the rest of class to talk among themselves. Adora relaxed in her seat, as if she had been pulled taut by rope, and they at last went slack.

She glanced over at Catra, who was looking back at her before quickly looking away. 

No, she didn’t look nervous. She looked _guilty._

The fire drill wasn’t planned, or else the fire department wouldn’t have showed up. There couldn’t have been a fire, or else they wouldn’t have left so quickly.

Adora looked her up and down. Catra didn't look at her again. She slouched low in her seat and doodled shapes onto the back of her hand. 

“What did you do?” Adora asked, quiet enough for no one else to hear.

Catra paused, glowered at her hand, bristling like a hunted animal, and muttered through clenched teeth, “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Then she went back to doodling her little thumb people.

_the day._

As soon as Adora leaves Catra’s apartment, she regrets it. She always does.

Because there’s always something else she could have said, something that she shouldn’t have said or something she’s glad she said, but if only she had said it differently. 

This time it's, _“I really appreciate your concern.”_

Wow. Is she a human being or a formal email? 

She could have said _Thanks for being here for me,_ maybe, or _I’d love to stay, but I can’t_ or _I don’t know how to act around you anymore if we’re not at each other’s throats, or down each other’s throats, so I’d rather not make this more awkward for the both of us._

This nagging fixation keeps her mind conveniently occupied in the rough half hour it takes her to get to the house. The labored, somber groan of the garage door closing mirrors a sound Adora wishes she could make.

Getting out of the car turns out to be a harder task than she thought it’d be. Even releasing the steering wheel takes a conscious effort that isn’t achieved until her knuckles have long gone bloodless. She eyes the Macbook sitting in the passenger seat of her car — at least she had half a mind to grab it before she ran out the door — and sighs, knowing there’s no point in putting it off any longer. Her mom did teach her to face her problems head on, after all. 

Tote bag in one hand and computer in the other, she walks into the house. It doesn’t feel much different. It’s only a bit past three. On a normal day, her mom wouldn’t even be home until a few hours later. 

Maybe she’s being paranoid, or she’s being sentimental, but she’s compelled to survey the length of the house. Takes in the arrangement of the pillows on the sofas, the mail left on the counter, the food left in the fridge. Sees her mom’s second favorite brand of almond milk, which means she couldn’t drive to Mystic to get the best kind.

She makes sure all the TVs are turned off. She turns off the upstairs air conditioner. She won’t need it until Bow and Glimmer arrive. She even checks the bathrooms. She only stops short at her mom’s bedroom.

That can wait. 

She has a paper to finish. She can worry about everything else once her paper is finished. 

Her phone vibrates, and for the splittest of seconds she thinks it might be —

It’s Bow. 

**Bow! (3:24pm)**

Hey! G’s done with her final so we’re on our way. Our ETA rn is 6:57.  
We love you. 

**You (3:27pm)**

Ok, great  
There’s no pressure to come btw!  
I’m gonna have my head in my computer all night for this paper, so I’ll be holed up anyway.

**Bow! (3:28pm)**

We’re not leaving you alone tonight.  
Do your thing. We won’t bother you while you work.  
We can stay in the guest room if you want! No distractions. 

**You (3:30pm)**

Loved “We’re not leaving you alone tonight.”  
Ok.

Nearly four hours later, the doorbell rings and the slightly distorted faces of her friends light up on her phone. Adora pushes out from the office desk to let them in. The sun’s setting. She hadn’t noticed.

She opens the door for Bow and Glimmer, and it’s not funny — like, at all — but she almost wants to laugh at their faces. It’s so _them._ Bright, plastered smiles on their faces, their eyebrows scrunched up, giving away how stressed they are and how hard they’re trying not to show it. It’s painfully easy to tell they grew up together.

“Hey, sweetie,” Glimmer greets, smiling, damn near cooing in a way she never sounds in real life. 

“Hey, Adora,” Bow immediately follows up with, with a hint of normalcy.

“Thanks for coming, guys.” Adora steps aside to let them in.

“Are you kidding me?” Glimmer says, reaching new octaves. “Of course we came!”

“And we bought Thai!” Bow holds up a humongous paper bag speckled with dark spots from the moisture and heaves it onto the counter once they make it into the kitchen. “We got pad thai, fried rice, spring rolls, drunken noodles. Pick whatever you want. Dealer’s choice.” 

“Technically, you’re the dealer, Bow,” Glimmer inserts, taking off her tennis shoes. 

“Right. Adora’s choice,” he specified.

Adora feels her face pull into a grimace before she can school it into a smile. “That’s awesome, thanks! I’m not really hungry right now, though, but maybe later?”

“Totally. It’s totally normal not to want to eat, when your body’s...you know…” Glimmer makes circular, jutting motion with her hands that, in all honesty, looks like she’s trying to mimic a pair of large breasts, but Adora spares her.

Besides, it’s not that she’s not eating because of some grief-induced burst of adrenaline. She’s not eating because she took an Adderall a few of hours ago, and her body doesn’t want food. Her nerve endings are itching to get back to editing and her deep dive into the Reed v. Reed case. 

“I need to get back to my paper, but make yourselves at home.” Adora fusses with her hair, pulling it all to one shoulder, running her hands down the mussed length of it. “The guest room is made up, so you can drop your stuff off if you want. Remote’s on the coffee table, water’s in the fridge, bathroom’s down the hall, you get the gist, right?”

“Adora, we’ve been here enough times. I think we know our way around,” Glimmer laughs, taking out the stack of plastic containers and rice boxes. 

“Right, right, good!” Adora throws them a rather unnatural thumbs up before she moves to leave.

“Hey, Adora?”

Adora spins on her heel. “Yeah?”

Bow opens and shuts his mouth a couple times, and dread pours into her. But then his mouth settles down into a breezy smile, and he says, “Good luck on your paper.”

She manages a tight smile. “Thank you,” she says. 

_ten years ago._

“That was pretty brutal, huh?” 

“I guess.”

Adora leaned back against the lockers, pulling at the straps of her backpack with her thumbs, while Catra swapped out books and binders from her bag to her locker. 

The incident on Friday got them an afternoon assembly that swiftly turned into a school-wide interrogation. Turned out that pulling a fire alarm when there wasn’t an actual fire was an actual _felony_. 

After an hour of lectures from the principal, a visiting firefighter and a young cop, and importunate threats to cancel the most anticipated events of the year if nobody confessed to the act, they were all sent back to class, devastated to have lost their spring dance and their field trip to the National Museum of Ancient Artifacts. Plus, poor Ms. Razz had to push back the test yet another day.

Adora bent her foot, dug the ball of her tennis shoe into the floor. It looked like a shiny path of coarse sand. “Maybe I should tell them it was me...?” 

If Catra did have something to do with it, and _she_ had something to do with Catra having something to do with it, then technically, it was Adora’s fault in the first place for being careless. 

The vicious slam of the locker nearly made her jump out of her skin.

“Are you _crazy?”_ Catra hissed. “I didn’t go through all that for you to-” She cut herself off, froze in place like a thief caught in the act, ensnared and unmasked. 

Adora jabbed a finger in her face. “I knew it!” she whisper-screamed.

“You don’t know _anything.”_

“I’m not going to rat you out, okay? Why would I?” she said with her hands up, insisting, her eyebrows up to hairline. “You totally saved my skin. It’s just… why would you do that if you hate me so much?” 

“You- You just…” Catra stammered, her eyes darting around the hallway. “You look so ugly when you cry. I was tired of seeing it.” Adora grinned. “What? Why are you smiling?”

“...You like me.” 

Catra looked outright disgusted. “No, I don’t.”

“Yeah, you do. You could have gotten into _so_ much trouble. You want to be my friend,” she practically _sang_.

“Don’t flatter yourself,” said Catra, all bite lost. She drew in her lips, and her cheeks jumped. Interesting.

The fact that Catra never smiled made her curious.

“I owe you one, you know,” she said, plucking up the courage to nudge Catra’s arm.

Catra looked taken by surprise. Then she crossed her arms and snorted, “You heard that cop. I could’ve gone to jail. How’re you gonna repay that?” Even though Catra was shorter than Adora, it was like she was peering down at her from on high. 

Adora truly didn’t know how to answer that question. She hadn’t thought that far ahead. “Um,” she pondered, worrying at her lower lip. “I’m really good at algebra? You can copy my homework anytime you want. Or, you know, I can snag you extra pizza at lunch or...” 

“I’m good at algebra, and the pizza tastes like greased up cardboard.” 

Well, she wasn’t wrong. Adora sighed, “Okay, I don’t know, okay? I’m grasping at straws, but you looked out for me. So I’m going to look out for you. That’s just how it works.”

Catra’s arrogant posturing crumbled, and she wrapped her arms around herself like she tended to do, shriveling back to her own size. “You don’t owe me anything, alright? Just forget about it.” She walked away, making it no more than two steps before Adora was in front of her again.

“Wait!”

_“What?”_

Adora spoke fast, spilling out an impulsive, hare-brained idea before Catra could lose interest. “I’ve been to the National Museum of Ancient Artifacts before! It’s actually pretty cool. I think that if I asked, my mom would be willing to take the drive for us.”

“Us?”

“If you wanted to go.” 

A two hour car ride — four, if you counted the ride back — and a full day with Adora’s proclaimed nemesis sounded like a recipe for disaster, but there was a time, short-lived as it was, before Catra’s malice and her spite. A time of splaying their bodies out in the grass and blowing dandelion seeds and impassioned, graceless hugs. 

Catra, seeming to consider her proposition, thoughtfully prodded her bottom lip with her thumb. “Fine,” she agreed, like she was doing Adora a favor. “But don’t make it weird.” 

“I’m going to make it a little weird,” Adora admitted. 

This made bushy haired, chipped nail polished, indecisive eyed Catra bite her lip and _laugh_. 

And that made Adora’s chest tickle. 

_the morning after._

Adora barely gets any sleep that night.

But she knew that’d happen. She only has the amphetamine to thank. 

Her paper was submitted at 11:50pm, even though it was to her satisfaction around 10. The rest of her night was spent doing more research (for funsies) and listening to the same indie folk songs on a loop, even after she’d long stopped enjoying them. She didn't cry. 

Now that it’s morning, the world is a little too bright and blurred at the edges, but she has to admit that it's comforting knowing that Bow and Glimmer are there when she chooses an arbitrary to “wake up” even if she’s not ready to face them just yet. She can picture them waiting with bated breath, eager to outstretch their arms for Adora to go flying into, but she doesn’t think she can give them that right now.

When Adora got the news at the hospital, she took it like a fact. Being informed of the steps she’d need to take to settle affairs was just a list of tasks. At one point she actually felt a drop of relief. She was still standing. She could inhale and exhale after the worst case scenario had finally come. 

She can't yet conceive a world without her mom in it, even when the prospect of it was looming over her head like an anvil from one of those old cartoons, even when her mom lost her hair and stopped eating, even when she could barely make it across the room and decay grew hungry for her skin. Adora couldn't imagine it. She still can’t.

Her mom is indestructible.

Her mom is gone. 

Everyone has a weak spot, it turns out.

**(456) 873-9117 (7:47am)**

i’ll be there.  
idk if i was clear about that.

Adora lies on her side, stares at her phone for far too long, her parched eyes grazing through the message over and over again. It’s such a simple text, she could easily just reply _Good to hear_ and get on with it. 

The hard part would be stopping herself from following it up with something reckless like _How are you_ or _I can’t do this without you_ or _I really loved you, but you already knew that._

Another text bubble pops up, and Adora watches the dots, panicked.

**(456) 873-9117 (9:01am)**

don’t hurt yourself.  
you don’t have to respond. just wanted to let you know.

She snorts mildly and falls into the rhythm of an age old beat.

**You (9:02am)**

What, have you been watching and waiting for me to respond for the past hour?

**(456) 873-9117 (9:05am)**

don’t flatter yourself either. 

**You (9:09am)**

Scorpia’s welcome, too  
If that wasn’t clear

**(456) 873-9117 (9:11am)**

i didn’t know.  
thank you.

**(456) 873-9117 (9:14am)**

but are you absolutely sure?  
you know i’m not exactly great at funerals

**You (9:15am)**

Catra, you lived with us  
I will ask that if you feel the urge to laugh, please disguise it as a sob  
But I am sure  
But I don’t want to pressure you  
If it’ll make you uncomfortable

It might be too soon. She might be ripping stitches out of wounds not yet closed, but there’s no one else who has more of a right to be there than her.

**(456) 873-9117 (9:17am)**

like i said  
i’ll be there

And if they go back to not speaking after, so be it. 

  
  
  



	2. i've seen lives with you.

_tonight._

“Don’t you think we should put in Won’t Have You?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Scorpia, DRYL is a _bar_.”

“It’s more of a lounge.”

“The point is: people are going to be drunk, and that song is a fucking mood killer,” says Catra. “I should know. I wrote it.”

She’s sprawled out on their living room floor with her arm thrown over her eyes. Scorpia is stretched out on the couch, balancing her laptop on her thighs, diligently typing up their setlist for their next show. 

“I hear you, but right now, every song is-” Scorpia snaps her fingers at a rapid pace. “We need to give them — and ourselves — a second to breathe. Like you said, our sets need to have, you know, an arc. This is more like a straight line. A fun one! But still.”

Catra would roll her eyes if they weren’t closed. Scorpia’s right, unfortunately, but it irks her to the core to witness the inevitable mass exodus to the bar whenever they play a ballad. It’s so _polite_ of her audiences to schedule their pee break for when she pours her most vulnerable thoughts out into the mic. So sexy of them. 

“Fine, then let’s do Scorpio. It’ll get the girls on their third double G and T in the mood. After You Look So Pretty...” Then after a moment of consideration, she thinks _fuck it_ and heaves a heavy sigh, “And Won’t Have You can go in, but it has to right before Garden. Whatever.”

“Perfect!” Scorpia adds the last two songs, tapping the keys with happy finality. 

“Perfect...” Catra echoes, much less enthusiastic. She sits up and uses her thumb and forefinger to rub her eyes. “Now can I go to bed?” 

“Uh...sure, but,” Scorpia refers to her laptop screen. “It’s not even nine yet. I used to think you never slept. You okay? You seem a little down.”

“Yep. Just the homophobic universe punishing for me yet again for not getting myself knocked up,” Catra groans, rising to her feet with effort, feeling nauseous and gross and five pounds heavier. “Too bad that’s never gonna happen.”

Funny. The only reason she was even home this afternoon is because she had called out of work on account of feeling like shit. In her defense, it’s something she never does and Tuesdays are unfailingly slow. Lonnie will thank her later when she gets to hog all the tips to herself.

And if she hadn’t bailed, she wouldn’t have been here to open the door for a certain blonde who came knocking at the perfect time. 

Catra wasn’t supposed to see Adora today. She’s not supposed to know what she knows.

She lumbers over to the table, picks up the mug Adora abandoned, still full and long gone cold. 

Scorpia jumps to concern. “Oh, no! Here, let me get you some Advil.” 

“No. Don’t.” Catra shakes her head before Scorpia makes it off the couch. “I just want to lay down.” 

“Okay, well, let me know if you need anything!” she offers, contently settling back into her seat.

For a second it feels like all the blood in her body drops down to her feet, leaving her lightheaded and dizzy yet planted to the floor. 

_Let me know if you need anything._

She used that line earlier. 

Like she was listening to her roommate complain about her period. 

Scorpia grabs her phone sitting beside her hip. “I’ll go ahead and text Entrapta. She’ll probably tell us that our BPM ratio isn’t optimal or something, ha.”

Catra closes her eyes. She doesn’t want to think about her. “I saw Adora today,” she says with the enthusiasm of a host informing a guest that a corpse is hiding beneath the floorboards.

Scorpia pauses her typing and looks up curiously. “Oh?” 

“Yeah...” She nods. “Her mom. She...died today.” 

“Oh. _Oh_ , that’s terrible.”

“Yeah,” is all Catra can say before she clamps her teeth down on her lips hard. “Yeah, and she, uh, she wants me to go to the funeral.”

“Oh...” Scorpia draws out. “Do you want to go?”

“No. Yes? I don’t know.” Catra walks to the sink and leans against it, mug still in hand. “Cemeteries make me itch.” 

Funerals, as a rule, are just deeply uncomfortable experiences. To see a whole life reduced to a plaque and a bouquet. She got as much at her high school graduation.

“Huh,” Scorpia hums, sounding surprised. “That surprises me.” 

“Why?”

“I dunno. I guess I’ve always thought that you’ve had a thing for the macabre.” 

Catra rolls her eyes. “Yeah, well. Not like that.” 

Lilith Spencer. Dead. The words don’t go together. 

Women like Lilith don’t die. 

Death should’ve shattered under her feet like glass against stone or ricocheted off her skin like a bullet against steel. She should’ve smiled at death’s back as it ran away on its hind legs.

“How’s she holding up?”

Catra shrugs, gazing into the gently rippling tea. “I mean, not great, I guess.” She has seen just about every shade of Adora, every color, but the image of her barging in, red-eyed and dazed and lost, is new and quietly sears her brain. 

She dumps the tea out into the sink when the image grows too vivid and leans her elbows back onto the counter. “Get this,” she says conspiratorially. “She shows up, unannounced, out of the blue, tells me her mom _died,_ then immediately up and leaves so she can write a fucking paper.” She gives her roommate a head shake that says _seriously?_ then scoffs as she dumps the tea bag in the garbage. “If that’s not the most Adora thing ever...” 

“She’s probably still in shock.” Scorpia offers. Pretty sensibly, actually. 

“No, that’s just _her.”_ Catra counters, not in the mood for sensible. “She’s always been like that. Even you know that.” She all but drops the mug into the dishwasher and slams it shut. “You’d think that maybe she’d take a break from being a perfectionist long enough to grieve her own mother, y’know?” 

“You did say her mom was a control freak.” Scorpia points out as she swings her legs off the couch, rapt with attention. “How did it happen?”

Rapping her fingers against the granite, Catra tensely answers, “Lung cancer.”

“God…” Scorpia shakes her head with pity, gripping her white shock of hair. “That had to be awful. Watching your mom slowly deteriorate like that.” 

Catra keeps tapping. She’d rather not think about the gory details. She’d rather not think at all. “I should’ve known...” she murmurs. 

“Known that she had cancer?” 

Catra frowns deeper, still tapping, the growing lump in her throat hardening. “Adora didn’t tell me. She didn’t tell me.”

She wants to unleash. She wants to rage about it. She wants to cry about it. But there’s a box in her mind, duct-taped past the point of recognition, labeled _A.S. Fragile. DO NOT OPEN,_ and she’s finally started to heed its warnings. 

“I mean... it’s not like you two are friends anymore.” 

Catra stops tapping. Her lip curls and she damn near snarls, but in a feat of self-control she purses her lips instead. 

She shouldn’t be offended by that. 

She shouldn’t be offended. 

She’s _not_ offended. 

She’s just —

She's selfish.

Because out of everything, this is what stings the most. 

“No, we _were_ ,” Catra’s eyes dart around the room while she searches for the word, and settles on, “...friends when she got sick. Apparently, Adora just didn’t think I was worth telling. I’m sure she told her pretentious Ivy League friends about it, though.” She wraps her arms around herself and buries her cheek into her shoulder, conscious of how much she looks and sounds like a pouty child but not really caring. 

There was a time when she knew everything about Adora. Like how she wasn’t allowed to watch cartoons as a kid and how dandelions are her favorite flower, even though they’re useless and technically not a flower. She used to know which smiles she meant and the ones she didn't, and she knew there was a big difference between her saying _I’m fine_ and _I’m okay._

She knew she had only missed school twice in her life. The first time was in the seventh grade because she got lice, and Catra told everyone she got the flu. She knew she would have tried out for the volleyball team in high school if she’d been given the choice. 

She knew every inch of her skin, every perfect blemish as if God placed them there with his own pen. It used to scare her, how much she knew. There had to be something dangerous in that. 

She thought she knew Adora, mind and body and soul and shit, and she didn’t even know her mom was dying, which means that Adora either didn’t trust her to know or didn’t care for her to know, and each possibility somehow stings worse than the other. 

“...Maybe this is an opportunity for you two to reconnect.” The suggestion, gentle as Scorpia says it, feels like a slap.

“What makes you think I want to reconnect with her?” Catra fixes her with the same stone-faced, daggered glower she used to instill fear in the hearts of her classmates back in high school. Scorpia’s immune to it by now. 

“Well, don’t you?”

“Hell no.”

“Are you _sure?”_

“Yes! And she clearly doesn’t want to either.” 

“Okay, sure, but she came all the way to the Waste to see you.”

“Yeah, and like I said, as soon as she got here she hightailed it back out like the fucking place was on fire.” 

Scorpia looks at her knowingly from the couch, and god, Catra wants to claw her when she does that. It makes her feel petulant. And stupid. It makes her miss the days when Scorpia gawked at her like the sun shined out of her ass. 

“I’m fine without her! I’m _better_ without her,” she insists, gesticulating wildly with her arms. “And she’s better without me. Obviously.” A humorless laugh breaks out of her. “Plus, she thinks we’re still dating, so…”

Scorpia furrows her brows. “And you didn’t tell her that we’re...not?”

“I didn’t know how to say it,” is the weak excuse she gives as she finds a sudden great interest in picking her nails. 

With her obnoxious brand of innocence, Scorpia shrugs and says, “I dunno, you could have kept it simple and said, ‘Hey, old chum, we actually broke up a while ago.” 

(Okay but maybe she didn’t want to be brought back to the night she and Scorpia called it quits after three pitiful months. 

Maybe she didn’t want to relive pathetically crying on Scorpia’s shoulder after admitting she was helplessly and fatally stuck in love with her former best friend. 

Maybe she didn’t want to own up to the fact that she only went after Scorpia to make her jealous, and even that didn’t work.)

“Sorry, my brain circuited out at _old chum,”_ Catra scoffs. “You know what, she doesn’t need to know my business. She’s not in my life anymore. I’m just going to show up at the service then leave Adora to continue on with her oh, so wonderful life.” 

“You’re my best friend, you know,” Scorpia announces out of nowhere, getting on her feet and walking towards her.

Catra takes a step back on instinct like a wounded animal, crosses her arms in front of her. “Ew. Why are you saying that?” 

“Because I want you to be happy,” she says calmly.

She also hates when Scorpia does _that._ If anyone treated her the way she did Scorpia, she would have told them to go fuck off in a ditch, and Scorpia has only retaliated with kindness and compassion. It sucks, and she still has needling thoughts that Scorpia is only pretending to be nice while she secretly plots her revenge.

She’s trying not to let her intrusive thoughts get the best of her these days.

“You don’t think enough time has passed for you two to try and work things out?” Scorpia asks, bypassing her to pull a glass down from the cabinet and pour herself a glass of water from the Brita. Catra breathes a sigh of relief from being spared of a sentimental hug moment. 

“She said I’m the ‘last person she wants an apology from.’ Does that sound like someone who wants to work things out?” She hates the way her voice cracks on the last word. Catra scowls at the tile floor and lowers her voice now that she can’t trust it to do what she wants. “I don’t want anyone who doesn’t want me. I gotta have _some_ respect for myself.” 

That part slips out without thinking. She avoids Scorpia’s eyes. 

When Scorpia doesn't say anything, Catra chances it and sees her not looking at anything in particular, but she looks...intensely contemplative. Then finally she says, as if she’s had an epiphany, “All this talk about what you don’t want, but...what _do_ you want?”  
  


_ten years ago._

Catra never wanted this. 

She never asked for this — to be sitting in the backseat of a freshly cleaned SUV, washed in the teal-orange glow of sunset, the scent of something sweet and woody in her nose, sharing headphones and listening to Pink with the girl she hated.

Used to hate. With a passion.

She _hated_ Adora. Even her mom knew she hated Adora, and she was dead. 

She hated her stupid ponytail and her bland blonde hair. She hated her stupidly perfect white teeth. Her stupidly perfect white sneakers. She hated how she came to school smelling like flowers and oranges. 

She hated her grating voice and how she had to use it to answer every question without ever giving anyone else a chance, and she hated how her answers were always _right_ and how she was the only one who could beat Catra in the mile run, how she was the only one who ever tried to beat her in the mile run. 

She hated how she could make her limpid blue eyes seem so sincere and how people gravitated to her, rallied around her, trusted her for no reason; and how she thought she was so much better than her, inviting Catra to sit at “her” lunch table in front of everybody to make herself look good. As if Catra was going to be another puff of air inflating her ego. 

Considering all this, it should have been so deliciously satisfying to watch her fall on her face in Razz’s class that day, to get to _feel_ her lose her shit at the mere prospect of bombing a test. Somehow she went wrong. She miscalculated and it wasn’t at all as much fun seeing Adora cry as she thought it’d be. (She hated that, too.)

So she did something. So dumb. 

It wasn’t a wholly selfless act to pull the fire alarm. It was almost an excuse. She had already been dangerously drawn to that tempting little red lever. Like, in the way that a tiny mischievous voice might urge her to run into oncoming traffic for no reason. 

_What’s the worst that could happen?_ was the last thought she had before she reached out her trembling hand, her heartbeat reverberating through her entire body with anticipation. 

_Oh shit oh fuck oh shit why the fuck did I just do that_ was the next, and she soon learned that the worst thing that could happen was a little thing called _jail time,_ so just like that Catra decided it was in her best interest to never go out of her way for anybody ever again. Until Adora pranced up to her locker like she owned it. 

_“You looked out for me. So I’m going to look out for you.”_

It shouldn’t have meant anything, but apart from the “needless waste of resources” that “were taken away from people in actual emergencies” Catra, for the first time in her life, had maybe, possibly done something _right_ , and so maybe there was a hungry part of her that wanted that to be true.

The next day Catra slid into her seat in English class and was immediately bombarded with Adora’s energetic ramblings about _whatever_ and suddenly she knew all this random stuff about her, like how her favorite color was red and how she was a sponsor for a horse on a ranch in the Valley and how she can’t eat avocado. As if they’d been friends for years. As if she had been biding her time and storing all this information for the moment Catra stopped hurling glares and snide remarks at her. 

And this past Monday Adora, biting back a grin, trotted her way after homeroom and subjected her to an awful game of _Guess what_ before telling her — not asking, for the record — that they were heading up to Arxia to spend the day on tours and gazing at old vases and shit. It wasn’t Catra’s immediate idea of fun, but she’d take any reason to get out of the city for once, even if it meant she had to deep clean the house three times before her aunt agreed. 

A fizzy mix of excitement and trepidation rattled her insides going into this morning, and it only intensified when she opened the door for Adora and her mom. Both were dressed like they were on their way to church or a job interview or something, and the most she’d done to look presentable was tame her hair down in an itchy beanie. 

It soon became very obvious that Adora’s mom didn’t like her. It wasn’t in what she said or did, but in _how_ she said it and _how_ she did it. Ms. Spencer was all curt responses and disapproving eyebrow raises and tight, close-lipped smiles that never reached her eyes as if Catra was infringing on their day together, like she invited herself. 

The museum was a sight to behold. Catra’s jaw nearly fell to the marble floor of the grand atrium in all its splendor. Swarms of tourists strolled around them — in all kinds of clothes, thank God — with cameras and accordion shaped pamphlets. It gave Catra sweet relief that Adora’s mom left them to their own devices, so long as they told her when they were moving to a new floor.

They started in the Hall of Human Origins where they ran into a huge group of what looked like college students. Adora had grabbed her hand as they weaved their way through so they wouldn’t lose each other, and she didn’t let go until they reached the other end, after their hands had long gone hot and clammy. 

That’s when Catra started to get why people liked Adora so much. On some level, she was beginning to remember. Adora knew how to make people feel special. 

Ms. Spencer bought them both lunch. Adora got something called a harvest bowl, so Catra got the same. She ate in silence while Adora rambled on and on about the exhibits they saw. Her mom interjected with follow-up questions and the occasional _“Chew with your mom closed, Adora,”_ and _“Swallow your bite before you take a new one.”_

They stopped by the gift shop on their way out where a measly bracelet cost _eighty freaking dollars._ Not that she had enough money to buy anything in the first place, but holy fuck. 

Though Adora did coerce her mom into buying them the corny shark hats being sold outside the shark tooth exhibit, and yes, she hummed the _Jaws_ theme song as she did it. 

“...and the space show was _so. Cool,”_ Adora raved from her seat on the other end of the car, gesturing excitedly with her arms, only held back by the constraint of the seatbelt. “I thought I was going to pass out when-”

“Use the proper names of the exhibits when referring to them,” Ms. Spencer cut in from up front. Her light green eyes peered through the rearview, but she maneuvered the car with smooth precision.

Catra knew that Adora was adopted, but man, they looked nothing alike. Where Adora’s eyes were round and expressive, Ms. Spencer’s were sharp and elegant. Adora’s glossy blonde hair radiated next to her mom’s sleek black pixie cut, and Catra’s skin tone was closer to her mom’s than Adora’s pale skin was. 

“Right.” Adora nodded and sat back with a thud and tied again. “The Universe Beyond exhibit was amazing.” She sat up again, for the hundredth time, and leaned over, her ponytail bouncing behind her. “Hey, mom. If I wanted to walk to the moon, I’d be eighteen by the time I got there. I could buy my own house by then!” 

“Good thing there’s no mortgage on the moon.”

“Or like, an atmosphere,” Catra chimed in.

Adora turned to her, smiling. “What was your favorite, Catra?” She still had that stupid hat on so it looked like her head was being eaten by a googly-eyed polyester shark.

Which meant that _Catra_ still looked like she was being eaten by a googly-eyed polyester shark. She fussed with the hem of her beanie, now lodged between her thighs. “Uh...I liked the volcano stuff?” Adora urged her on expectantly with a bob of her head. “I don’t know what it’s called.” 

“Oh! The Fires of Creation, I think?” she provided. 

She awkwardly shrugged again. “Yeah.” 

There was some light shuffling to her left and then the definite click of a seatbelt unbuckling. Adora scooched over to the middle seat and made a point to buckle herself in there. Her mom was serious about wearing seatbelts. It seemed she was serious about everything. 

“I’m really glad you got to come with us,” said Adora in that too earnest way that Catra was still used to despising, but she was grinning enough for her tiny dimples to show through. Catra liked them a little more every time she saw them. “I had a lot of fun with you.” 

Catra’s smile back felt stiff and unsure. Suddenly she wished she had dimples, too. “Yeah. Me too.” 

“C’mon. Let’s look at our pics!” Adora got in close and pulled out her phone. 

“Pics?” Ms. Spencer raised an eyebrow.

So did Catra. _“Our?”_

Catra hated taking photos. She had taken a bunch of silly one of Adora with the sculptures because she asked. So many, in fact, that an older couple they ran into made all these dumb jokes about Catra being Adora’s professional photographer. 

“Yes...” Adora grumbled defensively, pulling up her photo library. Catra watched the rapidly scrolling grid of photos as Adora moved her thumb down, down, down until she reached the first one of the day. The one her mom took of them in front of the giant sphere in the center of the atrium. Catra had forgotten about that one, already. Adora’s elbow was placed on Catra’s shoulder, her hip cocked, smiling wide enough to show her gums. Catra hands were in her pockets, her beanie pulled down to her eyebrows, her mouth screwed into a crooked attempt at a smile. 

Adora giggled, “Wow, you look like you hate me.”

Catra put on a smirk. “What, you’re just now figuring that out?”

Adora stuck her tongue out at her and flicked through the photos one by one, all of herself. She wasn’t smiling in most of them. Really she just wanted Catra to snap her in goofy positions with the sculptures and artifacts. Catra’s favorite was the one with Adora on her knees in front of a sculpture of a man pointing down at the ground. She pointed at herself with a dumbfounded look on her face as if to say, _Who, me?_

Catra watched listlessly as picture after picture slid on the phone screen until a picture of _her_ popped up. “This one’s my favorite,” said Adora, beaming at her proudly.

Her jaw clenched preemptively as she peered down at it. It was of her standing in front of the Wall of Insects with an awestruck smile on her face. There had been hundreds of insect models placed on the wall, of all different sizes and brilliant colors. It was beautiful and gross at the same time. That’s what Catra liked about it. 

There were other photos of her too, come to find out. One of her somewhere in the Human Origins Hall pointing at something up and faraway, her mouth wide and open, her eyes alight. Another was of her with her eyes closed, sticking her tongue out for some reason. 

She pushed the phone away. “I knew you were sneaking pictures of me…” 

“Duh, I was taking pictures of you. You’re so pretty,” Adora said, like that was a _normal thing to say._

Catra’s face went warm. She didn’t respond and instead turned to look out the window, halfway wishing she could jump through it. A passing said they were still fifty-miles out from Etheria. 

“What?” Adora pressed with a teasing smile. “You are.”

“Stop it!” Catra snapped, covering her face. Nobody gave out compliments like that and meant them. Besides, she knew she wasn’t pretty. She didn’t have Adora’s huge eyes and porcelain skin and hair that never looked like it was angry at her. Catra was all bones, bumps and body hair. Even her eyes were wrong. 

“No, come back!” Laughing, Adora took hold of Catra’s wrists and pulled them down, revealing the glare Catra set her face into behind them.

An abrupt change in the music playing from Adora’s form shifted the atmosphere. “Ave Mary A” faded into “Glitter in the Air,” ushering in a slow, wistful melody in their ears. 

“Do you know this song?” Adora asked.

“Duh, I know this song.”

They listened to the song in silence until…

_“La la la la la la la la!”_

Startled, Catra’s head snapped to the girl passionately — and horribly — singing on her shoulder, like she’d gone mental. 

Adora didn’t stop, only lifted her head, melodramatically gripped Catra’s arm with both hands and fixed her with a sort of challenging invitation as she sang, _“Calling me sugaaaaar!”_

A short snicker bubbled out of her before she could stop it, and she relented. _“You called me sugaaaaaaar!”_ They sang, obnoxiously loud and out of tune, completely uncoordinated in their riffs but making up for it in passion. Catra tilted her head back and laughed, throaty and content.

“Woah, Catra!” Adora marvelled, pushing a wayward strand of hair out of her face. “Your voice is amazing...”

Yours is...terrible,” she quipped back, like it was some sort of mouth spasm, but she hoped it'd get Adora to stop giving her these weird, fake compliments. 

Adora wasn’t offended. She threw her head back and laughed so hard a snort came out. “Well, my shower likes my singing, so take that!”

“Uh, I’m pretty sure your shower cries itself to sleep at night,” said Catra, grinning when Adora put a hand to her chest. 

“ _Ouch…_ ” she said, faking hurt. “You’re the reason for the teardrops on my guitar, Catra.”

Somehow Catra managed to laugh and groan at the same time. “Argh, you know I’d rather pour battery acid in my ears than hear that song ever again!” 

Adora snickered and got close to her face. “Wow, you have such a way with words.” 

Catra pushed her face away and made a face back, “And you are _such_ an idiot...” 

Their laughter died when Ms. Spencer peeled the car off onto the shoulder of the road, their bodies lurching forward when she came to an abrupt stop and turned the car off. 

Adora’s mom remained facing forward with an unreadable expression when, in an unsettling even tone, she commanded Catra to “step out of the car, please.” 

Catra didn’t move. 

She couldn’t. She was too stunned and confused to do anything. The car chimed in the silence. 

Adora spoke up, her voice the smallest Catra’s ever heard it. “Mom...”

“Stay in the car, Adora.” Ms. Spencer opened the door when the road was clear of passing cars. “Catra, I will not ask you twice.”

 _Not that you asked,_ Catra thought but she did as she was told, her heart pounding. Her feet met mushy grass, and the dying light in the sky only made it all the more eerie. She anxiously pinched her bottom lip. The possibility of actually being left here felt very, very real.

Ms. Spencer glided over to the passenger side with her arms crossed. She rapped her neatly filed nails against the sleeve of her blazer. At her statuesque height she towered over Catra, peered down at her through her nostrils. Catra nearly flinched out of habit, but when she lectured, it was different from how her aunt yelled at her. There was no explosion, no blistering heat. She spoke with the kind of calm, meticulous intensity to be expected from a high-level attorney. 

“Now,” she started with the faintest tilt of her head, “if I recall correctly, my daughter has invited you on a wonderful and educational trip where your admission, food and souvenirs were all paid for, and you repay her by barraging her with insults?” 

Fumbling for words, Catra croaked, “I wasn’t-”

“I’m not finished,” she interrupted, promptly holding up a hand, then raised an inquisitive eyebrow. “I am curious. Has your aunt taught you anything about gratitude? Or respect? It certainly seems not. Because you should consider yourself fortunate. You should be thanking her. I expect you to get back in your seat and apologize.”

Catra pricked half-moons into the meaty flesh of her palms. Her shoulders were up to her ears by this point. Heat roiled in her stomach. It roiled with burning indignance and shame until it flatlined and Catra felt like a dirty squatter in her body. She stared up at the woman before her and didn’t say a word.

“Do you understand?” Ms. Spencer asked, as if she couldn’t understand plain English. 

Slowly and very much against her will, Catra nodded. 

With the barest hint of an artificial smile, she said, “Good. I’m glad,” and it sounded so genuine it could only be condescending. “You may get back in the car now.”

A part of Catra wished they would just leave her there. A car zoomed past on the interstate, and that silly urge to run into oncoming traffic returned. She yanked the door open, slid back into her seat and slammed the door behind her. 

Adora didn’t look Catra in the eye. Catra didn’t look her in the eye either, but she fixed her eyes on her knees instead and mumbled, “Sorry.” The word was bitter on her tongue.

Adora in turn glowered at the headrest in front of her and explained, “Mom, we were only joking...”

Ms. Spencer didn’t acknowledge this. “Put your seatbelt on,” she instructed, pulling back out onto the highway. 

They rode the rest of the way home in silence, and Catra knew as sure as she knew her own last name that she would never hang out with Adora again.   
  


_tonight._

_One, two, three, four._

“Hey! Hey, there!”

_One, two._

Catra flips the bottle of triple sec back into the well, scoops ice into the cocktail shaker and places the strainer and lid on top, giving it a good tap with the heel of her palm. 

“Hey there, beautiful!”

Patrons of the _male_ variety always think they’ll get somewhere by calling Catra attractive when really they’d get further with _king_ or _empress._ At least _your majesty._

Avoiding eye contact is a practiced skill, an art that Catra has been cultivating and refining since she was seven, and the douche with the struggle ‘stache and the fake Rolex is going to have to wait until she’s done making this margarita for the beautiful redhead enduring the most awkward Tinder date Catra’s ever eavesdropped on. 

She pours the last of the shaker’s contents into a salted rocks glass and sets the glass on the coaster in front of her. “Do you want to start a tab?” she asks neither of them in particular. (Ask the man and you get called a misogynist. Ask the woman and you’ve insulted her date’s masculinity.) Predictably, the guy hands her his debit card; she swipes it through the POS system and hands it back without a smile. 

Idly nodding her head along to the beat of the diabolically catchy electropop song blasting through the speakers, she lets her gaze wander across the bar aimlessly as if she has nobody else to take care of, just to be an asshole. 

“I know you see me, pretty girl.” 

Oh, fuck _off._

Her eyes slide over to him, critically scrutinizing him from head to toe. “What can I get you?” she says flatly, staring at his bald head that vaguely reminds her of a pencil eraser.

“Those your real eyes?” he asks.

Catra rolls her very real eyes. “No, these are made of glass. I keep my real ones in a jar at home.” 

He stares at her, confused.

She stares back, expressionless.

“ _Ohhh_.” He points at her with a stupid grin on his face. “I like you. You’re funny.”

“So I’ve heard. Can I get you anything?”

“You can get me your number.” 

Her eyebrows shot up. “Not on the menu, my guy.” 

He tries to look hurt. “Aw, come on. I’m a nice guy.”

Catra’s lip curls and she retorts impatiently, “Well, I’m a mean lesbian, so what do you want?” 

He takes the hint. If you could a blaring siren a _hint_. “Bud Light. Draft.” 

A goddamn Bud Light.

Catra scoffs through her teeth, not caring if he notices. She grabs a pint glass from the counter behind her and moves to the tap, near where Lonnie is cashing out a check. 

Nights with the two of them tend to be a wild card. They’re either a well-oiled machine, or it’s a minefield, but as long as Lonnie doesn’t try to tell her how to do her own job or monopolize their already limited real estate with her huge _ass,_ then they usually fare well together. 

“Wanna help me make three LITs, two strawberry mojitos and a rosé for the bachelorette party over there?” Lonnie asks, staring at the printer, holding her hand out to catch the receipt spitting out of it. 

Catra holds the glass under the tap at a ninety degree angle, gradually bringing it down as the poor excuse for lager trickles from the spout. “Sure,” she drawls. “I’ll get the rosé, you get the rest.”

She doesn’t have to look over to see the flat look on Lonnie’s face, but she chuckles as if she did. “Let me drop off this beer for your boyfriend first.” And when Catra does, she slams the glass down hard enough to send some of the liquid sloshing over the rim. “You want to start a tab?” She snatches his card when he pushes it towards her, and Catra swipes it through. 

She glances at Lonnie for her reaction, but she’s chatting up whatever group she’s closing out, letting her southern twang seep in way more than necessary. Her friendly customer service face falls away, however, once she joins Catra at the well.

“You’re fired,” Lonnie says, disgusted. Catra laughs high and loud _._ “Your days are _so_ numbered.”

“Oh, I am _so_ scared _.”_ She lines three cocktail glasses out in front of her, swiftly pours a half ounce of rum into a hall of them and hands the bottle over. “I’m making the Long Islands. I’m not muddling for you.” 

Lonnie takes it and says, _“Thank_ you,” in an annoyingly pointed way because apparently Catra doesn’t say it enough, and the barbacks have their little panties in a twist over it, but one: why does she need to thank them for barely doing their job, and two: maybe she’d be more polite if she didn’t have to ask three times for fucking limes. 

“Yeah, you’re welcome,” Catra says offhandedly, pulling out the tequila bottle to add to the cocktails. Tinder Girl gets up to go to the restroom, leaving her freshly made margarita all alone with Tinder Boy, so _great,_ now Catra has to take it upon herself to watch her drink for her. 

“What are you up to this weekend?” Lonnie asks conversationally as she gathers a handful of mint.

“I got a gig at DRYL Saturday,” she answers selectively, shamelessly haughty. Sure, it’s not Staples Center or anything, and it’s one of those “barstaurants” that wants to be too many things at once, but it’s a step up from the dive bars they started out with. 

“Ah, so you think you’re hot shit now?” Lonnie reaches over to put the Bacardi back in its place.

“I’ve always been hot shit, Lonnie,” she brags with a shit-eating grin, now pouring a seamless line of vodka into the glasses. 

Lonnie snickers, “I still have photos from junior high that would say otherwise.”

Catra masks her internal wince at the memories with her smirk. “It’s cute how you’re still stuck in the past. Not all of us peaked in the eighth grade, you know.”

“At least some of us grew out of our bitchy high school phase,” Lonnie snorts.

“Are you really insulting the girl helping you out because you can’t handle more than three drinks at a time?” Catra shakes her head, wrapping her fingers around the gin and triple sec. “Real classy.”

Lonnie pauses in her handiwork, raises an eyebrow and points a finger at her from around the seltzer spout she’s holding. “See, that’s why nobody likes you.” 

Catra’s smirk falters. God, does Lonnie know how to suck the fun out of semi-friendly banter. 

“Good thing I’m used to people not liking me,” she mutters under her breath, glaring at the glasses as she sprays a splash of Coke into each one. “Here.” She sets the three glasses on the bar mat. “I’m gonna go take a smoke break.” She jerks her head towards the couple with an empty seat and says quiet enough for only them to hear, “Watch that lady’s drink. The guy looks like a fucking weirdo.” She heads out back without waiting for a response.  
  


_ten years ago._

“I’ll walk you to the door!” Adora offered in one quick breath once they were parked in the empty driveway of Catra’s house. 

Catra stuffed her hands in her pockets and didn’t agree or protest because clearly everything that came out of her mouth was horrible. The crickets were out by then. Their chirping and the hum of the engine filled the silence between them as they ambled in an uncomfortable silence up to the door. 

“I’m so sorry about my mom,” Adora said once they were up the porch steps. Her face was flushed pink and she kept nervously tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “She can be...intense, you know? God, that was so humiliating!”

Catra frowned at her. What did she have to be embarrassed about? She wasn’t the one who got chewed out on the side of I-5. 

“I like you,” Adora went on. “A lot. I think you’re funny, and cool, and...I don’t know…” She shrugged with a wobbly yet rosy smile.. “I kind of like when you’re mean to me.”

“So…” Catra spoke in a murmur, her eyebrows drawn down and her hands still in her pockets. “You’re saying I’m mean?”

“No!” Adora put her hands up as if in surrender. Just like that day in the hallway after the assembly. “I just mean, it’s fun when you tease me and stuff.”

Then Catra crossed her arms and jutted out her chin, a little louder. “So you’re saying I’m a bully?” 

“No. I don’t! I mean-”

“Calm down.” Catra let her face and stance relax and lightly rolled her eyes. “I’m just messing with you, dummy.”

Adora stilled for a moment, her eyes like saucers, then relaxed. “Yeah. Yeah, like that,” she said, smiling wider now. “Just maybe don’t call me that in front of my mom?”

“Yeah, yeah, I got the message,” she mumbled, looking down at her feet and scuffing the sole of her shoe against the fading white painted wood. “Well, just so you know, you don’t have to be so _nice_ to me...”

“Huh?” Adora tilted her head, confused.

Catra twitched up her shoulders. “You know, with all the compliments and stuff.”

Somehow, Adora managed to make herself look even more confused, like she was trying to work out an overly complicated equation. “You don’t like it when I compliment you?”

“No, I-” Catra sighed and drug a hand down her face. “I’m saying you don’t have to say things you don’t mean.”

“So...you’re saying I’m a liar?” Adora countered. “I mean what I say when I compliment you.”

“Oh, come on,” Catra scoffed. “A month ago you hated me.” 

“A month ago _you_ hated _me.”_

Now it was Catra’s turn to look confused. “So...what? The only reason you didn’t like me was because I didn’t like you?”

“Uh…” Adora licked her lips. “Basically, yeah,” she admitted, blushing. “Why’d you stop? Liking me, I mean.”

“I don’t remember,” Catra lied, self-consciously rubbed a spot on the back of her neck. “Just me being a dumb kid, I guess.”

“Guess we’re both idiots, huh?” Adora joked. Catra clamped down hard on her lip.

Neither of them said anything else, not knowing what else to say, but, in Catra’s case, not fully ready to part ways. 

“I’m sorry about my mom again,” Adora apologized.

“It’s okay,” Catra replied, brushing it off. “I’m used to adults not liking me.” Adora seemed taken aback by this, so she cracked a smirk as if it was a light joke and changed the subject. “But for the record I didn’t even get any souvenirs,” she said, defensive. “All I got was this dumb shark hat, and that was _your_ idea!” 

“A good idea.” Adora grinned up at the hat that Catra was still donning. “Besides...” The grin turned mischievous. “It’s not the only thing you got...” She pulled something out of the pocket of her white cardigan, keeping it close to her body like she was trying to hide it, even though the porch was mostly obscured by the two bloodgood trees flanking the opening of the steps. Catra gawked down at it, shocked still. It was the arm cuff from the gift shop. “I saw the way you were looking at it,” Adora said by way of explanation. 

“I… I wasn’t-” Catra almost took a step back when Adora pushed the piece of jewelry and in her hands. She held it limply like it might bite her. “You swiped this for...for me?” she asked, disbelieving.

“Oh. Uh, yeah. Yeah, that is what I did.” Adora cleared her throat, her voice jumping to a higher pitch. “I’m totally a swiper.” 

It was hard to see in the light, so Catra waved her hand in the air to trigger the faulty motion sensor porch light and lightly ran her fingers over the tapered solid brass. It kind of looked like something Wonder Woman would wear. 

In truth, she wasn’t staring at the cuff because she actually wanted it. She picked it up because she thought it looked interesting. The only reason she stared at so long was because she was trying to figure out what was so special for it to cost so much. 

But now, she _wanted_ it. Now it felt special in the way that a price tag couldn’t name. 

Obviously Catra couldn’t say all that, so she met Adora’s eyes. The porch light played on them in a really interesting way. She smirked and settled on, “Cool.”

Maybe she'd hang out with Adora one more time. 

_tonight._

Obviously Catra doesn’t use her smoke breaks to _smoke_. She tried that once. Never again. But if everyone else can take ten minutes from work to shove toxic chemicals down their lungs, she can take ten minutes from work to do whatever the hell she wants, too.

She pushes open the massive door to the backlot with her shoulder and the music fades to a distant muffle behind her when it shuts. There’s a foldout chair placed against the wall, still wet from an earlier rain shower. Having been on her feet for a good six hours now, Catra’s tempted to plop down on it anyway, but she leans her back against the brick instead, pulling her phone out of her back pocket to indulge in a few minutes of mind-numbing scrolling.

Only her heart stutters when she sees she has a missed call from a number saved helpfully as _Do Not Answer!!!_. 

Which is funny now considering you can’t answer someone who never calls. 

She calls back before she can talk herself out of it. It only rings twice. 

“Hello?”

Catra roughly threads her fingers the ponytail she stuffed her hair up into. “Hey, Adora.”

“Hey,” Adora says quickly and quietly, like she’s worried about getting caught. “Do you have a second?”

An irritatingly persistent weight tugs at Catra’s chest at the sound of her voice, not for the first time. Not even close. 

“Uh-huh,” she glances at the door, like she could be caught, too, and meanders past the dumpsters to settle against the half-wall that separates the back of the bar from the adjacent parking lot. “I’m at work right now, so I’ll have to keep it quick.”

“It’s almost midnight,” is Adora’s astute observation. 

“Well, it’s a bar, so…” Catra sighs, then asks in her lofty voice, “How are you doing, princess?”

There’s a long pause on the other end. Catra thinks to backtrack, but Adora finally responds, “Nothing. Well. I have something to ask.”

Catra braces herself as all her nerves go on high alert. She doesn’t realize how clenched her teeth are until she snaps from the silence Adora leaves her hanging in. “Well?”

A loud rush of air filters through the receiver. “Okay, before I say anything, you can totally say no to what I’m about to ask. This isn’t how I normally like to do things, but-” 

“Just spit it _out_ , Ador-”

“Sing, could you sing?” Adora blurts out.

Catra falls silent. 

She wouldn’t think twice about it if it was anyone else and the price was right. But it’s _Adora,_ it’s Adora’s _mother,_ and the funeral is in _four days._

Adora takes another audible deep breath, and continues, her voice dripping in apology, “I know this is very last minute and I hate doing things last minute. And I wouldn’t ask if I had another option-” 

_Yeah, yeah, I get it,_ Catra burns to say, _I’m the last resort._

Instead she stammers, like a dumbass, “You...you want _me_ to sing?” 

“Yes,” Adora answers. Then adds, like an afterthought. “You’re a very competent singer.” 

Catra snorts, “Woah, slow down there. Don’t make me blush.” 

It’s ironic, really, that the only reason Adora is reaching out to her willingly is because she needs something from her. The wounded and petty part of her wants to point that out but alas, her spite has its limits. 

Adora doesn’t say anything to that, and Catra almost wishes she did smoke so she could have something to do with her fumbling free hand. “It is late notice,” she says. She's stalling because even if she can’t say no, she can’t just give in.

“I know. I know. I…” Another breath. “I haven’t found anyone that feels...right yet.” 

“And _I_ feel right?”

“Would you rather do her makeup instead?” she asks innocently without a missing beat. 

“Adora,” Catra hardens her voice, tries to inject it with the strength of a boulder. Adora has to stop trying to make light of the situation, because Catra’s bound to slip up eventually. She doesn’t understand how Adora can joke in the first place, but the only intimate death she’s ever experienced firsthand happened when she was too young to understand what death meant. 

“I’ll pay you, of course,” says Adora, almost like nothing happened. “Name your price.”

“Don’t be stupid,” Catra tells her, damn near offended. “You don’t have to pay me.” 

“I’m going to pay you,” she insists evenly. “It’s not like you can stop me.”

“It’s not like you can make me take it.”

“Oh, trust me, I can make you take it.” 

“I don’t want any of your money,” Catra shot back, an unwelcome warmth creeping up her neck. Adora probably doesn't even realize how she sounds. “You couldn't afford me anyway.”

That familiar snort laugh rang through the phone. “Oh, okay.”

Catra sighed and dug her thumb into the space between her eyebrows, an agitated mantra of expletives ringing through her head. “So what song are we talkin’? ‘You Raise Me Up?’”

“So close. Have you ever heard ‘To Where You Are?’”

Catra scoffs, “Of course, I’ve heard ‘To Where You Are.’” She’s never heard ‘To Where You Are,’ but it can’t be that hard to learn. 

“Okay, wonderful,” Adora says, suddenly all business, like they’re concluding a meeting and Catra is nothing more than a colleague that she wouldn’t even go to happy hour with. “There will be an accompanist provided for you, and I’ll send you a copy of the program once it’s finalized. And thank you, Catra. I really appreciate…” She clears her throat. “Thank you.” 

“You’re welcome, princess,” Catra responds, and now she doesn’t feel bad about calling her that because now she actually is a little offended. And now she needs to get back to work before anyone comes looking for her. “I’ll see you Saturday,” she says in lieu of goodbye and presses the end button. She shoves her phone back in her pocket and knocks her head back against the wall once, then twice for good measure. 

It’s a peaceful night on the strip, even for a Tuesday. In the distance, there’s the occasional whisper of faraway conversation, the scattered thump of car doors opening and closing, and of course, the steady beat of the music playing from within. All Catra hears, though, is Scorpia’s words replaying in the back of her head. 

_“All this talk about what you don’t want, but...what do you want?”_ she’d asked.

 _“I want to go to bed,”_ Catra had ground out in response, which she eventually regretted because even after she did just that, she could only restlessly stare at her ceiling, then the wall, then back to the ceiling again on an endless loop. 

Because whenever she closed her eyes, all she could see were blue eyes gazing down at her, soft and warm and captivated, like Catra was the only thing in the world worth looking at.

And all she could hear was her voice on a loop, choked and hoarse and furious, declaring again and again and again, _“You need me, Catra. You’ll do anything to keep me around. Even if it means ruining my life in the process.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you dudes for the comments! they always get me flustered in the best way possible. 
> 
> i've started tweeting to myself at @bluemxxne if ya ever wanna chat.


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